Big Mama Does the Limbo!!

Earlier, I wrote that when the weather got cold here in Prescott, we mountain bikers head south for a little warm weather down in the deserts.  Sometimes, when time is at a premium, we have to ride close to home if we want to maintain a little fitness.  Last Monday was the case when I just needed a little time in the saddle.  I had to get my truck worked on, and conveniently the tire shop was located near the end of Wolverton trail.  As I set out from Ponderosa tire, I decided it would be nice to ride a portion of the Whiskey, see how my fitness was.  Taking Copper Basin rd. to Camp Pearlstein and up trail 393.  Shortly after starting 393, the snow storms back in Nov and Dec had make the trails a little more trecherous.  Not only were they muddy and snowy, several trees had fallen over, the most notable is the  tree that made Big Mama do the limbo.


The riding was great, a little sloppy, but I was happy to be out.  The weather was perfect, lower 50's, sunny, and no wind.  I got down to the parking lot at Copper Basin and the next mile or so was terrible, almost making me wish I hadn't gone out for a ride.  Much of trail 48 on the S. side of Copper Basin is on the N face of the hillside, resulting in lots of unmelted snow.    The first portion was mostly flat, in and out of the snow, but ridable, just a little wet and soupy.  However, after the first switchback, the flat turned into a climb and the snow turned into ice.  The trail was darn near impossible to keep traction on.  If the rear tire wasn't spinning, the front was sliding.  The upside was it was great practice for spinning, if you had anywhere in your pedal stroke that had more power, the back wheel would spin and slip out from under you.  Super smooth pedal strokes were necessary.


There was a good quarter mile that had to be walked.  I wasn't sure that I could even keep myself and the bike on the trail it was so slick.  The portion around the waterfall I normally have no issue with I didn't even attemp.  I thought to myself, maybe I should just turn around and head back to the tire shop.  But once I reached the top, my whole attitude changed.  The trail dried up and was ridable and the best part was just about to come.
About 6 weeks prior, I rode up from White Spar Rd at the School House Gulch Campground on the almost completed Wolverton trail.  I was told it was complete, but as I near the top, it sputtered out and ended into the hillside just past Quartz Mountain.  It was fun, but I had to turn around and it ended my ride prematurely.  
On this day, I started to ride down from trail 48 to Wolverton. The new section of the Wolverton trail had been completed and was bypassing the old quartz mtn section of rough 2 track.  I have to give lots of credit to the guys who built this trail.  I know Prescott Mtn Bike Alliance and the Over the Hill Gang had a lot to do with it construction.  It was a blast.  Great fast single track for a couple of miles with very little hard pedaling, it couldn't be beat.  Fast corners and a couple of jumps make the trail very fun without being too technical.  Made the rest of the snow and ice well worth the effort.  If your ever in Prescott and have the opportunity to ride the Wolverton trail, take it, you won't be disappointed.

Jason Maneely, SFR              
Keller Williams Check Realty
The Stephanie Woods Team
928-925-6050
jpmaneely@kw.com

Is Your House Feng Shui? Part 2

Last week, I had a post to see if your house followed the rules of Feng Shui.  If yours fell short, don't worry, like anything, there are ways to fix your space.  This second article follows up on the first and lets you know how to fix those problem areas in your home if you want it to be more Feng Shui.

Feng Shui Cures

In the home I am renting, there was a deck at the back of the house that was closed in to make a year round Arizona room.  The original layout of the floor plan for the house was a rectangle.  By adding the Arizona room, the house essentially changed into a different shape, eliminating most of the wealth corner, and increasing the relationship corner.

It’s important to know that when Feng Shui works with missing corners, rule of thumb is that if an addition is less than half the width or length of a room or house, it is an extra section.  (This type of addition might be something like an addition of a bay window, or a small bump out.  In that case, an extra section could create GOOD Feng Shui, because there is more room in that area for the chi to circulate.)  Anything larger than half the width or length of a room or house creates a missing section.  In the case of my home, this created a missing section. 

There are many features of western homes that would be considered inauspicious by Feng Shui practitioners.  However over thousands of years, cures for each of these have been established!    There are eight major types of cures used to compensate for lacking features, to encourage positive energy flow:  Color, reflective objects (lights, mirrors, and crystals), plants and pets, mobiles and flags, statues and rocks, fans and flutes.  Placing a particular object in the area of concern will primarily force fast moving chi to slow down, and encourage slow moving or stagnant chi to move in a positive way. 

In addition there are representations of four elements that can be placed in specific areas that will balance the energy:  Metal, Water, Fire, and Earth.

A metal element could be sculpture or a table with metal legs, for example. Water would be represented with an aquarium or water fountain.  Earth could be represented with a quartz cluster.  Fire symbols could be a painting with the color red.  There are many variations on how these elements can and cannot be combined.

How did I fix the missing wealth corner of my home?  Before I tell you how I did it, you need to know that I rented this home before even seeing it in person.  I was moving to the area and found the house for rent on Craigslist.  The photos looked good, so I asked a good friend of my to drive to Prescott and take a look at the house; I wasn’t renting it sight unseen. She gave me the ok, so I signed the lease and moved in. I did not know that the wealth corner was missing in the home.  However, remember, there’s a cure for everything!

When I moved in there were some decorative elements I installed, mainly because I liked them.  But they also happened to “coincidentally” create Feng Shui cures for the missing area.  I created a large water fountain on the floor at the far left of the Arizona room (which did have some part of the wealth corner), and surrounded it with green plants.  The fountain pump came with a light, so I have chi  (both light and water) circulating there 24/7.  I never turn it off except to clean it out.  And of course it sounds wonderful, and provides humidity to the house as well.

I also hung a large spiral wind chime inside the Arizona room, which featured faceted

crystals, and reflects the light further into the missing area.  Fortunately, there is an additional deck downstairs that visually “completes” the corner, and that really works to help anchor the energy too.  I have reaped the positive benefits!  And, even better, when I find the perfect home to purchase, I’ll already know what to do if it needs a little energy boost.

So if you feel you need assistance in enriching certain areas of your life, remember that not only is your home is a reflection of you, it’s a reflection of your energy, and it can always be improved!  I promise if you take the time to do some research, investigate

the principles of Feng Shui, and apply even one or two of them in your home, you will be pleasantly surprised!

Kathleen is available for private consultations in the Prescott area, for your home or business, at kathleenagraham@gmail.com, or her cell (702)-672-2356.

Jason Maneely, SFR              
Keller Williams Check Realty
The Stephanie Woods Team
928-925-6050
jpmaneely@kw.com

How to make your house Feng Shui, Part 1

Lately, I've been showing houses in the Prescott area to a women who is into the art of Feng Shui.  I have to admit, I know nothing about it and in all honesty, didn't really care.  However, the more Kathleen taught me about how energy flows around a room, the more I wanted to know.  I asked her to write for my blog on what makes a house more or less Feng Shui.  Without any further comment...

I’ve been house-hunting lately, and I take all the principles of Feng-Shui into consideration whenever I look at a house.  Feng-Shui is the ancient Chinese art of placement.  It’s based on thousands of years of observation of how energy or “chi,” sometimes translated as “universal life force” flows in nature. 

When these observations are put into practice in your home or business, harmony, balance, and prosperity are said to follow.  Feng-Shui uses something called a ba-gua (basically an octagonal shaped map) to help understand where and how energy flows in various areas in your home or business.  It can even be applied to your desk or cubicle at work. 

A flow of good, positive chi in and throughout your home will depend on many factors.  Primary of these is that there should be no missing corners in your home.  The ideal Feng-Shui configuration for a home is usually a square or rectangle.  If a corner is lacking in a home, for example in an “L” shaped layout, the corresponding energy for the missing corner will also be absent.  This can affect your finances, relationships, health, and other critical areas of your life. 

The ba-gua is used to determine which areas of your home correspond to each aspiration.  Clockwise from the top side of the ba-gua, the eight areas affected are Fame, Relationships/Marriage, Children/Creativity, Helpful People/Travel, Career, Knowledge/Spirituality, Family, and Wealth.  The map of the ba-gua is superimposed on a drawing of the home’s floor plan (based on the orientation of the home’s front door) to find any areas that may be lacking or need assistance in manifesting the correct energies desired.  The Career area of the ba-gua is always placed at the front door of the home.  So then the wealth corner, for example, is in the far left corner of the home, and the Relationship/Marriage corner is the far right corner of the home.

(diagram courtesy of www.thespiritualfengshui.com)

I once visited an office that was missing the Wealth corner.  I knew that business was not going to last long, and sure enough, it did close about two months after I was there.  Another client I worked with owned a business that was always suffering financially.  The business itself looked fine energetically, but when I asked the owner about what he had at home in his wealth corner, he admitted he had a desk in that corner that was piled with clutter.  Clutter is a big no-no in Feng-Shui, because it blocks the chi from circulating.  I advised him to clear out the clutter and keep the desk area neat and organized, and as soon as he did this, his customer traffic immediately picked up.

So if your home is lacking one of the key corners, don’t despair!  In Feng-Shui there are fixes (otherwise known as cures) for everything.  Next time, we’ll find out about the basic cures and how to apply them.

Kathleen is available for private consultations in the Prescott area, for your home or business, at kathleenagraham@gmail.com.

Jason Maneely, SFR              
Keller Williams Check Realty
The Stephanie Woods Team
928-925-6050
jpmaneely@kw.com